Taffy Stuck and Tongue Tied
by chaelzbellz
Summary: Kind of a 1st for me. Ive done couples but mostly as a side component of stories focusing on siblings. This me trying to flip it & do a romantic story btwn an FNL character & an original character from my other story "little sister stories" Wish me luck!
1. Chapter 1

Kind of a first for me. I've written about couples, but usually as a side component of stories focusing on siblings. This is me trying to flip it and do a romantic story between an FNL character and an original character from my other story "little sister stories." If you haven't already read that story just know that in it Lydia Saracen was introduced as Matt's little sister. This story takes place early in season 4. Wish me luck!

"What is that racket?" My grandmother said turning up the TV.

"It's just Landy, Grandma." I explained before turning to Matt. "Tell him if he honks that damn horn one more time I'm gonna rip his head off."

Matt sighed. "Come on Lyd. Panther Pizza's in the opposite direction of East Dillon. He's doing us a favor giving you a lift to school."

"Doesn't mean he has to be a jerk about it." I said shoving a couple last minute items into my bag.

"He's not being a jerk. He's just being...Landry."

"Well right now, I'm not really seeing the difference." I said.

He cringed as we heard the honk again and went to the door. "I'll go tell him to wait a second."

I was just saying bye to Grandma when I heard Landry yell out my name. "That's it! That. is. it!" I rushed out to the car.

"Here she is." Matt said, wincing slightly when he saw the look on my face.

"Landry Clarke I'm gonna ki-" I stopped mid-threat realizing someone else was in the car with him. "Hey Luke." I knew him. More knew of him. We had science together. He also was a large part of the reason the football team didn't (at least totally) get destroyed every week so I knew him from that too. We hadn't really talked much, which kind of made sense. He seemed kind of shy and I wasn't exactly Miss Outgoing when it came to people I didn't know.

"Hi Lydia." He said. "My truck started acting funny. Didn't have time to fix it before school so-"

"SO I had to pick him up at his house and then hustle over here, just so you could make us late anyways." Landry complained.

"Ya'll aren't late." Matt said.

"I told him to stop honking." Luke explained.

"Yeah well Landry's not much for following good advice." I said.

"I'm sitting right here." Landry said. "You're being rude."

"Rude?" I said. "You want to talk about rude? How about honking that dang-"

"Okay, that's enough. If you keep fighting, ya'll _are_ gonna be late for school." Matt cut me off.

"Matt's right. Get in Lydia." Landry said.

"You want shotgun?" Luke offered, already halfway out of the car.

"Probably best that I'm out of punching Landry range." I said. "But thanks."

"No problem." He smiled.

"I'll try and bring back something for dinner." M att offered.

"Sounds great." I said trying hard to paste on a smile. I held it until we pulled away. "Damn."

"What?" Landry asked.

"There's only so many times I can eat last call panther pizza before my stomach goes on strike."

"So tell him to stop bringing it home." He suggested.

"I don't want to hurt his feelings." I said. "Besides we can't really turn down free food right now. Panther Pizza isn't exactly paying Matt a fortune and I had to drop some shifts at work now that school's started."

"Well I offered you that job road managing for Crucifictorious." Landry said.

I rolled my eyes. "I need a job where I actually get paid Landry."

"I told you I'd get you all the free Crucifictorious t-shirts and stickers you want."

"That's easy since I don't want any." I said.

"Why not? In a few years they'll be collectors items."

"They'd collect dust in my closet if that's what you mean." I said. "Besides do you really think my grandmother's gonna let me wear a Crucifictorious shirt around the house, let alone in public."

"She would if it was for work. If you explained that you were working as our road manager then-"

"Uh Landry?" Luke stepped in. "To need a road manager, don't you actually have to be on the road."

"What are you talking about?" Landry said. "We're on the road. We're totally on the road...Maybe not physically, but you know, we're on the road to being on the road."

"Gotcha." Luke said and turned to me. "I think you should take the job."

"Oh you do?" I asked skeptically.

"Heck yeah." He said seriously. "They're on the road to being on the road. How many jobs offer that kind of growth opportunity?" He broke into a goofy smile.

We both cracked up as Landry shook his head and pulled into the parking lot. "You know what Luke, you're lucky Tinker's giving you a ride home. Maybe he'll offer to take Lyd too, because neither of you are even getting in my car again."

"Oh you wouldn't leave me stranded." I said, ruffling his hair. "Besides, you know I've been there, front row every time Crucifictorious has ever played."

We got out of the car and Coach Taylor walked by. "Hey Coach." Luke said.

"Hey ya'll. Better get to class. First bells any minute now." He said.

"On our way sir." Landry said.

"Alright then." He nodded. "Lydia I'll see you, Matt and your grandmother at dinner on Friday?"

"Grandma's baking a pie." I said.

"Isn't that nice." Coach said. "Julie says she's gonna try and make vegetarian meatloaf or somethin' like that. I don't know how heck you can make a meatloaf without any meat. Guess we're just having loaf."

"Thanks for the heads up." I said. "We can stop for burgers on the way over to your house."

"Lydia, you pick me up double cheese and I'll owe you one." He smiled before turning to the guys. "Luke, Lance 3:15, full pads." He headed toward the field.

"I-it's Landry." He said quietly as coach walked away. "How does he know Lyds name and not mine? I mean _I'm_ on the team. I've _been_ on the- It's Landry. It's not that hard. It's like laundry, but you know, more land." Luke and I both stared at him for a minute before laughing again. "You know I'm starting to think ya'll aren't laughing _with_ me."

A/N: That's a little taste of what I'm trying out. Thanks for giving it a shot! Hope you liked it!


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: MERRY CHRISTMAS! So I've decided to keep going with this one. Here's the new part. Hope you like it!

Turns out my first period teacher was out sick anyway. We had a sub, but she just told us to reread a chapter in the text book so I pulled out my sketch pad. I'd been working on figure drawing for a while. I wasn't good or anything, Matt definitely got the art genes, but it was always a good way for me to relax. I didn't like to draw at home anymore though. It felt like rubbing it in Matt's face that he'd given up art school to stay with us. So now I had to make up for it with drawing at school when I got the opportunity. I decided to use the sub as my figure. Since I only had her for 45 minutes, I thought it'd be best to leave things like texture and stuff like that for later.

By the time class was over I'd gotten a lot of the ground work done and was really excited to start on the details so I was kind of bummed when I got to my next class and the teacher was actually there. Not just because, lets face it, having a teacher out sick's kind of like winning the lottery in high school and it would be awesome to parlay that feeling into the next period, but also because I wasn't finished with my drawing.

I was a little early to my next class and jumped at the chance to pull out the sketch pad.

After a minute I heard someone say "You're pretty good."

I instinctually covered the page and turned to find Luke. "Oh, hey." Right, this was science class.

"Is it cool if I sit here today?" He asked, pointing to the chair next to me.

"Sure," I moved my bag. "You sure the guy you normally sit with wont feel cheated?" I said gesturing to the skeleton with a backwards baseball cap our teacher Ms. Miller had glued to one of the seats. Luke, not knowing anyone on his first day, had chosen to sit there and kind of got stuck with it.

He laughed. "No I think Jack'll be just fine."

"Jack?" I asked.

"Yeah." He said and sat down. "I named him Jack Skellington...Is that weird, that I named him- I mean it...It's from Nightmare Before Christmas...It was a movie. I-I mean it's still a movie but it came out when I was-" I just stared at him. "Do you draw a lot?" He said, frantically looking to change the subject and I couldn't hold back my laughter anymore. "What?"

"Dude I totally know who Jack Skellington is." I said. "I just wanted to see how long you'd go on like that if I let you." He looked away. "I guess it was kind of mean of me. I'm sorry, I was just joking. I wasn't trying to..." It was then that I saw him trying to hide _his_ smile. "You're messing with me aren't you? You're terrible. I thought I'd really hurt your feelings."

Now he gave up trying to hide it. "Oh she can dish it out but she can't take it, huh?" I playfully hit his shoulder.

"Everybody take out a blank sheet of paper! Pop quiz!" Ms. Miller skreeched.

_When did the whole class get here?_ I thought going into my bag for some paper.

The test was essentially just our homework questions from the night before in restated, multiple choice sentences so i breezed through it. Ms. Miller collected the papers and started lecturing us how important safety equipment was. I guess a few kids had been in the lab a few days before (without exactly getting permission) and ended up singeing their eyebrows off. So the principal was making all science classes re-watch a video on lab safety.

Luke handed me a crumpled up piece of paper. "Bored to death yet?"

"Any deader and I'll give Jack Skellington a run for his money." I wrote back and tried to ignore how happy it made me watching him read it and smile.

After what seemed like forever the video was over and Ms. Miller cut us loose. "Thank God we took time to watch that again." I sighed sarcastically. "Otherwise I would have never known not to look into a bunsen burner."

"Don't forget not eating off of balances." Luke said.

"Shoot!" I said, thinking about what he'd said.

"What?" He asked.

"Eating. I forgot about the news paper luncheon today." I explained.

"We have a newspaper?"

"Yes-No-Not yet." I said. "That's what the luncheons about. I guess there was some interest with the East Dillon kids before the merger and a couple of us that transfered over were on the Panther Paper so we're trying to start something up here."

"That's pretty cool." He said.

"I guess, but what's not cool is that I was supposed to get my brother to draw a mockup and I totally spaced on it."

"Why don't you do it?" Luke suggested.

"What?"

"There's a whole 'nother period before lunch and you've got a sketchpad and pencils and stuff." He said.

"What?" I repeated. "No. Even if I could probably get away with drawing during class next period, my drawings aren't drawing or even sketches really. They're- it's just doodling."

"First off, from what I saw they seem like drawings to me." Luke said. "And secondly drawing, sketching, doodling who cares. It's just a mockup right? You could literally make the dang thing on a magnadoodle, as long as its the general idea, it'll be fine."

"I- I guess." I thought about it. "I mean we'll find somebody official by the time we really start to print, right?"

"Exactly." He smiled.

"Lyd?" Ella Riggins said walking over. We'd known each other since we were kids, but weren't what I'd call friends for a while. But the both of us making the transfer over to East Dillon had made us closer. She was now looking at me suspiciously. "We're gonna be late for Health." She said slowly.

"Oh yeah." I agreed.

"Well I'm this way." Luke said, pointing toward his next class.

"Alright, well I guess I'll see you around." I said, heading the opposite direction.

"Good luck Lydia."

"Thanks." I said, feeling my cheeks get warm.

"What the heck was that?" Ella asked before Luke was even out of earshot.

"What?"

"_What_?" She mocked. "You know what. I didn't know you knew Luke Cafferty."

"I don't know Luke Cafferty. Why are you just standing there, you're the one that said we'd be late." I said dragging her to class.

"Oh like I give a rats ass about Health." She rolled her eyes. "I just wanted Luke to leave so I could find out what was going on...So what's going on."

"He got a ride from Landry this morning and he's in my class. We're not like buds or anything."

"_Buds_? What century are you from?" Ella said. "Lydia, I'll admit the whole serious loner thing doesn't really do it for me, but even I'll admit Cafferty is pretty cute. Now you haven't been on a date in...ever?"

"I've been on dates Els." I said.

"Really?" She asked. "Dates that didn't include the words 'group' or 'study' before them?"

She had me there, but I didn't want to admit it. "And when was the last time you went on a date, Miss Know-It-All?"

"I went on a date last night, thank you very much."

"One that didn't include the words 'six pack' and 'cow tipping'?"

She shrugged. "I grew up around my brothers, what the hell do you expect? And that just makes my point."

"Which is?"

"Lyd, if anyone knows how to deal with the serious loner type it's you. I mean it'd be just like dealing with your brother."

"Yes," I said sarcastically. "because nothing turns a girl on more than equating a potential suitor with her brother."

"Potential suitor? Really, what era were you born?" She said. "Nevermind, what's important is you and Luke have chemistry."

"We do." I said. "Five times a week including a lab period."

"I meant romantic chemis-"

"I know what you meant." I said. "And how the heck would you know. You saw us together for half a minute in the hallway."

"Girls can just sense these things about other girls, Lydia."

"Just get in the room before we're late." I said leading her into the classroom.

"Bossy." She stuck her tongue out. I convinced Ella to sit in front of me during class. Being that she'd been the tallest girl in our class since 5th grade, I used her as a block so I could draw during class without being caught. It was the first time I'd ever been worried when I heard the bell ring signaling class was over. I looked at the mockup and sighed. "I guess that's the best its gonna get."

Ella wasn't exactly interested in the newspaper so she said she'd see me later and I headed to the library to meet the rest of the group.

"Hey Lydia." Julie Taylor said when I came in. She'd gone from mild nuisance, to brothers girl friend, to brothers ex, to brothers girl friend and my friend all in a few years. To be honest, the friend part hadn't come around until relatively recently.

Matt was more than my brother. He was my best friend. I resented Julie when they were together and I thought she was all he cared about. I downright hated when they weren't together and she'd been so crappy to him. I hadn't really forgiven her for all that until the past spring. Matt was all set to go to Chicago (and I was all set to pretend it didn't break my heart) when he just changed his mind and stayed home. He said it was about Grandma and me, and I'm sure part of it was. But I knew mostly it was about Julie. And this time I didn't mind that. I had to appreciate it. Over the summer I finally gave me and Julie a chance at friendship with a fresh start and it turns out she was pretty cool (i guess there was a reason my brother liked her after all).

"Hey Jules." I plunked down in the seat next to her and grabbed a slice of pizza. "Where is everybody?"

"Late as usual." She shrugged. "I guess that's not gonna change no matter what school paper we write for. Did you get Matt to do the sketches?"

"Um I...Here." I didn't know what to say so I just reluctantly handed over my sketches. "The thing is I forgot so I did these last minute and I know they're not as-"

"Great." She said. "These are awesome."

"-good as...wait what?" I asked confused.

"Nice job. They're awesome." She repeated as people started filtering in. "Hey guys, take a seat."

I tried to hide my smile and the meeting started. It was mostly organizational stuff. Julie getting nominated to be our peer editor, coming up with ideas for our name and settling on a faculty advisor, stuff like that. Even though she'd said my mockup was good, I still felt a little tense when she held it up to show everybody. A few people had some suggestions, but overall the rest of the group seemed to like it. Actually they more than liked it.

The meeting finished leaving a few extra minutes left in the lunch period. Even though my next class was in the opposite direction, I made my way to the lunch room. I didn't want to admit it, but when I saw Luke clearing his tray I knew I'd gone there looking for him.

"Luke." I said and he looked up from the garbage can.

"Hey Lydia." He said. "What's up?"

"Oh nothing." I said. "You're just looking at the new visual coordinator for the East Dillon Dispatch, that's all."

"No way!" He said. "Lydia, that's great. What does a visual coordinator do?"

"I have no clue. I'm pretty sure Julie made it up on the spot." I said.

He laughed. "Very cool. Good for you. I mean, I totally want my cut, but good for you."

"Your cut?" I asked.

"Yeah. Who convinced you to draw that mockup in the first place? I'm like your muse or something."

Now I had to laugh. "My muse, huh? And that's why you deserve a cut?"

"Uh-huh. I'm thinking 10%"

"You drive a hard bargain, but it's a deal." I said. "So what exactly is 10% of 0 dollars and 0 cents?"


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: Hey! Here's the next part. Hope you like it!

I went through the rest of my classes on a high from the events of the day and soon enough it was 3 o'clock. I had to wait for Landry to get through with practice, but I was used to it after Matt having football after school. I used the time to get most of my homework done before work so it wasn't a waste. About 15 minutes before practice was over I went and changed into my Applebees uniform and then went over to the field.

"Right on time." Landry said. I watched his teammates pass us heading out of the locker room. "What are you looking for?"

"What? Nothing." I said and we started for the car. "I don't know how ya'all always have so much energy after practice. I get exhausted just thinking about all that work." Giving Landry an excuse to talk about how tough he was for being on the team was exactly what I was aiming for. He took the bait hook, line and sinker.

"So you like Cafferty huh?" About 5 minutes later. I guess I didn't veer the conversation the way I had hoped

I nearly choked. "W-what? Wait- What? Why would you think that."

"Oh please Lyds." He said. "Ella Riggins isn't exactly Fort Knox. She said you two were hanging out together."

"We were coming from the same class." I said.

"And then Tinker saw ya'll talking at lunch."

I rolled my eyes. "I swear, one day I'm gonna live in a city with enough people that not every single banal conversation makes the front page."

"So you're saying you don't like Luke?"

"I just barely met him!" That wasn't a lie right? "And since when do I have time to like anybody. And-"

"Alright, alright. I get it." He said. "Poor Luke."

"What does that mean?" I asked.

"Well the poor kid finally comes out of his shell and he's got a crush on you and only find out you don't even like him. You sure your names not Tyra?"

"Landry Clark, you ever compare me to Tyra Collette again and I'll punch right in the- wait..." I stopped for a second. "What was that first part?"

"Huh?"

"About him having a crush on me? Luke has a crush on me?" I asked. "Why would you say _that_."

"Because he does?" Landry said. "I mean he asked about you a couple of times."

"What specifically did he say?"

"What do you care?" He asked. "You don't like him."

"I never said that." I said staring out the window.

"So you _do_ like him." He said. I shrugged. "Ugh I was right, you are just like Tyra." I punched him in the arm. "Ow!"

"I warned you." I said. "You're lucky I missed."

"Missed?" Landry asked. "You hit me square in the arm."

"Well I was aiming lower."

"Yeah well you almost ran us off the road." Landry said pulling in to the parking lot at my job. "I could probably take you to court for that. Reckless endangerment of a minor or something."

"I'm younger than you, you idiot." I said grabbing my bag and getting out.

"You don't even know enough to tell when you like somebody. So who's the idiot now?" He asked and I slammed the door and walked away.

My shift was pretty busy that day and for once that was a good thing. Not just for the tips, which we definitely needed, but for the emotional time out. It had been a pretty weird day for me. Cool, sure. But weird. It was nice doing something mindless and routine. By the time Matty showed to picked me up, I was practically thinking normal.

"I didn't bring home any pizza." He said.

"No?" I asked, secretly relieved. "That's fine."

"Yeah, Shelby said she'll make dinner." Matt said, referring to our fairly recently returned mother. He'd found her when he was trying to get himself emancipated, but we got more than a signature out of her. She just kept showing up at the house trying to...i don't know, make us like her i guess? At first neither of us could even stand to look at her. Matt was so angry at her, but it was different for me. I'd spent my life trying not to be my mother. I knew my father saw her when he looked at me and I hated it. That was just back when she was just an idea. But when she was standing right in front of me, laughing and talking and smiling the way I did, it tore me up. Dad was right, I was like her. It's just that lately things had been different. I mean wasn't calling her Mama or anything, but I was starting to think maybe things weren't as one sided as I'd always thought between her and my father. And she seemed sincerely interested in making some kind of relationship with us.

Matt went on about some costumer he'd had to deal with and I gave him some generic answers about my day and before I knew it we we home.

"Somethin' on your mind Lyds?" Matt asked as he pulled in.

I thought about telling him. I mean when you grow up with it mostly being you and your brother against the world, he becomes your best friend. Nobody knew me better than Matty. But he was still my big brother and something about that made me feel weird about talking to him about a boy. And what was there to say? All I'd done was get a tiny crush on some guy who Landry claimed liked me. But then again Landry did tend to exaggerate. And maybe this whole crush thing was just the effects of Luke popping up in my day more often then normal. "Lyds?"

"What? Oh yeah, no nothing." I said. "I'm fine."

We went inside and said hi to Shelby and Grandma before going to change out of our work uniforms. Since I started during football practice I was able to bulldoze through my the rest of my homework before dinner was ready. Matt said he was going over to the Taylor's house to see Julie. He asked, like always, if I wanted to come and I always said no. They were amazing people and all but it just didn't make since for me to hang out there all the time like Matty did. Grandma had fallen asleep so I went back into the kitchen where Shelby was packing up the leftovers "Hey." She said.

"I can do that for you, since you cooked and all."

She smiled. "No that's alright sweetheart."

"Dishes then?" I asked.

"Alright, if you want to." I grabbed the rubber gloves and started in on them. "Something on your mind?" She shrugged.

"No." I said. "I mean not really."

"Anything happen at school today?"

I was about to tell her just what I told Matt until I remembered. "Actually I was voted visual coordinator for the paper."

"Really?"

"Yeah. It was kind of a fluke thing. I meant to ask Matt to make a mockup for our meeting, but I forgot. So Luke suggested I try it myself and I did. Julie really liked it and put it to a vote and I got the job."

"Well congratulations sweets." Shelby said. "That's awesome."

I blushed a little. "Thanks."

"Who's Luke?"

I stopped. "uh..what?"

"Luke." She repeated. "Is he on the paper too?"

"No." I said. "He's one of Landry's teammates."

"Oh, a football player huh?"

I rolled my eyes. "Stop it."

"Stop what?" She said. "I'm just saying back when I was in high school, the football players were all pretty cute."

"Yeah, well now Landry's a football player so I think it safe to say times have changed."

"Does this Luke know you have a crush on him?"

"No! What? I mean-" I stopped for a second and regained my composure. "Shelby, what made you say that?"

"I guess," She said taking the soapy cup out of my hand. "girls just have a sixth sense about what's going on with other girls."

"Ugh." I groaned. "Now you sound like Ella."

"It's little things." She sat down at the table and I followed her. "Like the way you smiled when you said his name, and froze when I said it. Both red flags on a new crush."

I sighed. "I don't have time for a crush."

"It's not a wedding, its just a little crush." she said. "Sugar, if you don't give yourself time for the occasional makeout session, what's the point of being a teenager?...Damn. That wasn't very 'momlike' thing to say, was it?"

"Probably not." I said with a smile. It was kind of nice having a "momlike" person to talk to so I sorta went with it. "...Landry says Luke likes me too."

"Well how could he not? You, Lydia Jean Saracen, are hands down the most beautiful girl in town."

I rolled my eyes. "_That_ was a 'momlike' thing to say."

The next day was a game day. Even in a school with a craptastic team like the Lions, if its football and in Texas, its still a big deal. Landry talked my ear off about the difference between the Panther jerseys and Lions jerseys and even though I couldn't care less, I was glad he didn't bring up me storming off the day before so I pretended to listen. That was kind of habit for me and Landry. He'd do something annoying, I'd blow up and then we'd both talk about something trivial instead of either one of us apologizing.

"Hey there 8-5." someone said when we got out.

"Tim?" Landry said. "Hey man, hows it going?"

Tim shrugged. "Just giving Els a lift." He said nodding at Ella. "Hey there mini 7."

I was about to respond when Ella cut me off. "Tim what did I tell you about that?"

"What?" He asked.

"Names Tim." She said. "People have them."

"Fine. How do you do Miss Saracen?" He said sarcastically tipping an imaginary hat.

"You are such a jackass." Ella said. "Lets go Lyd."

I tried to hide my smirk. "Bye ya'll."

Being a game day, after forth period pretty much the whole school went to the gym for a pep rally. They weren't as big and flashy as the ones we used to have for the Panthers (especially since we couldn't really boast about any of our stats) but it was still a break from the day. I found Julie and we spent the rally eating pop corn and making fun of Landry, who stood with the team trying his best to dance along to the band music. I caught myself looking at Luke while Coach was talking. He had his head down and was really listening to the speech, nodding or smiling occasionally. That cute goofy smile I was beginning to really like. I was glad he kept his head down, honestly. If he had looked up and seen the way I was looking at him, the whole crush thing would have been kind of hard to miss.

What was all too easy to miss was Ella. I'd looked for her when I came in, but I still hadn't spotted her in the crowd. Once the rally was over I headed to lunch and finally saw her up ahead of me. I practically had to speed walk to catch her as she darted through the hall. "Ella. Ella would you slow down."

"What?" She said. "Oh. Sorry. Just got a lot on my mind."

"Wanna talk about it."

"No." She said quickly.

"Alright then." I wasn't surprised. Ella Riggins wasn't exactly the easiest person to get to open up. Good thing I was what I'd decided to call persistent. Ella often referred to it as being nosy...which I totally wasn't. It's just that when two girls are brought up in football country, sometimes friendship works like the game. Ella had a damn good defense so my offense had to be a little agressive. "You get that essay for Health done?"

"Yup." Fumble

"Get your history paper back?"

"Yeah, a few days ago. Got a B." Incomplete pass.

"So Tim's back in town, that must be nice."

She rolled her eyes. "Whatever." Touchdown! And just like that her entire defense crumbled. "I was just getting used to Tim being away at school and missing him and all. And God knows I missed the hell out of him, but now Billy and Mindy are all pissed because he wants his room back, but that was supposed to be my room and my rooms gonna be for the baby. And so Billy all but told Tim to get out."

"And Tim fought him on it?"

"No!" She said. "He just up and left. God knows where he stayed last night. He picked me up at the bus stop this morning, but was being a moron and wouldn't tell me where he'd been. And I refuse to talk to Billy 'till he apologizes to Tim and Billy wants Tim to apologize to Mindy for some dumbass reason. It's all so dumb."

"Els, I'm sorry." I said.

"What for?"

I paused, confused. "About all that stuff going on with your family."

"Oh that's nothing." She said grabbing a tray and getting in the lunch line. "Yelling and fighting in the Riggins family comes just like breathing."

"Ella-"

"I heard Gus Hutchen's parents are out of town tomorrow night." She cut me off. "He's throwing a party. You in?" And just like that I could tell that was the end of our previous conversation.

I sighed and figured I'd better just drop it. "Nope, I have work."

"You always have work." Ella said. "It is possible to fit a little fun in your life."

"What do you want me to do." I said sitting down at the table. "Nobody wants to work Saturday night and I have to take advantage of that."

"Are you at least going to the game tonight?"

"My family's going over to the Taylor's tonight for pregame dinner. It'd be kind of awkward to bail on the game after dessert." I explained.

"Good." She said. "Then after we're going to the failure party."

"Don't call it the 'failure party' Ella." I said.

"Well it'd be kind of misleading to call it a _victory_ party, now wouldn't it."

I said a chucked my napkin at her. "Well I guess we know who the award for Miss Team Spirit's going to."


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: Hey guys! Here's the next part. Hope you like it!

By the end of the day I was actually kind of excited about the game. I got home with just enough time to help Grandma put the finishing touches on her pie and change into my East Dillon sweatshirt. Matt got it for me over the summer when I found out I had to transfer. I didn't exactly take it well at first.

Matty got kind of panicky when we were already running late and Grandma decided she wanted to hand make whip cream for her pie, but we finally made it over to the Taylor house. Grandma and Mrs. Taylor spent a while coo-ing at Gracie Bell while Julie and Matt were busy coo-ing at each other, leaving me with Coach Taylor...who unfortunately wasn't kidding when he said Julie was making vegetarian meat loaf. Even though I was barely able to scarf that particular part of the meal down, it was a really good time. Coach and Mrs. Taylor had to leave right after dinner. There was a pregame booster thing that they were both dreading.

"Hey LJ?" Matt said after we helped Julie wash the dishes.

"Oh Lord." I said.

"What?" He asked.

"You only call me LJ when you want me to do something I sure as heck wont want to do."

"I do not." He said.

"_LJ can you talk to Grandma's insurance people, they like you better. LJ Landry's throwing himself another 'Tyra Collette doesn't love me pity party'. Can you help me cheer him up? _It's so freakin' obvious."

"More obvious than _Brother_?" He asked.

I mock gasped. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Oh so it's just a coincidence every time you make me do somethin' awful it's _Brother can we play my lame boy band music in your car? Brother will you come kill this huge bug? Brother will you make a midnight store run to get me GIRLY PRODUCTS._"

"Hey." Julie stepped in. "Are you two gonna need a time out over here?"

"We're good." Matt smiled and she walked away. "Thing is, Lydia I do kind of have a favor to ask."

"No really?" I said sarcastically.

"The Taylors have to leave now, so I was thinking maybe if you and Grandma leave with them Julie and I could meet you before the game starts." He said.

"But I don't wanna go to that booster thing." I said.

"Landry might be there."

"Aw Matty..." I whined.

"Lyd." He said carefully. "I've been working all the time and it's kinda been a while since me and Julie were alone...you know like _alone_ alone and-"

"Okay stop right there." I said. "We'll go to the stupid booster thing if you promise to never ever finish that sentence."

The boring booster event was just that. Coach and Mrs. Taylor were whisked off just as soon as we stepped in the door and Grandma found some other women from church to gab with. Half the team, including Landry, hadn't even gotten there yet so i decided to go for a walk. My phone rang and I scrambled for it in my bag.

"Hey." I said, after seeing Ella's name on the screen.

"Dale Floyd just sent me a text asking if I would 'let him change my oil' tonight during the party." She said.

"Um...What?" I asked.

"Yeah, who says chivalry's dead."

I paused. "So what're you gonna do."

"The only thing I can do." Ella said. "I'm gonna find Dale Floyd and I'm gonna kick his butt so hard he needs surgery to take his pants off and that's a damn promise."

"You're a real delicate flower, is what you are." I said. "Well when are you planning this butt kicking. Somebody's gonna have to pull you off him and I have a feeling it's gonna have to be me."

"I figured on tonight during the party." She said. "What are you wearing by the way?"

"Probably PJs since I'm not going."

"Lydia!" She yelled.

"I told my Grandmother I'd help her set her hair curlers tonight."

"Well as much fun as that _doesn't_ sound, I'm not having this argument with you again. You are going to the failure party. You promised you would."

"No I'm not and no I didn't. And would you please stop calling it the failure party. We might win." I said and she scoffed. "We might! Come on, stranger things have happened."

"Lydia, Coy Delmont claims he was abducted by aliens and I can honestly say I believe that story more than I believe the Lions have a chance in hell against Jefferson tonight. Jefferson Almost beat _the Panthers_ last year, remember?"

"Yes I sure do, but we both know Jefferson's in a rebuilding year." I said. "Half of their whole roster just graduated. So guess what? Now their stuck with a bunch of practically JV players who barely know a block from a blitz on a team that could barely deal with man to man coverage in the first place. If we play to their weaknesses, the Lions totally have a shot tonight."

"Wow." I whipped around and saw Luke standing there.

"Oh, hey." I said.

"Who's that?" Els asked. "Was that a guy?"

"I gotta go okay? See you tonight." I said, but I still heard her demanding to know who it was until I hung up. "Hey." I said again. "You here for the booster event?"

"Yeah, Coach says we all have to put in at least 5 minutes of face time." He explained as we started walking back. "You here with someone?"

"Yeah. My grandmother."

"No I-" He smiled. "I meant like were you here like-"

"Oh like on a date?" I was by far the biggest goon in Texas. "No. It's just me and...my grandma..."

"That's- That sounds cool." Luke said. I laughed. "What?"

"Cool? I just basically said I was on a date with my grandmother."

He smiled. "I think it's cool. What would you rather me say? It's adorable." I scrunched up my nose and shook my head. "Okay adorable's out. What about..."

"Hey Cafferty! Over here!" One of the other players yelled as we entered the room. At some point the whole team had arrived. They were about to take a picture with some of the boosters.

"Coming!" He said before turning to me. "I gotta..."

"Yeah, it's fine." I nodded. I thought about calling Ella back, but I figured I'd see her later so I went over to Grandma. She was still talking to the church ladies but they took a break to do that old lady interrogation all teenagers love. "How's school? How's your brother? How's your Daddy? Do you like boys yet? You seeing anybody special?" When they got bored of me they went and found somebody else's grandkid to terrorize and me and Grandma sat at one of the tables. She'd just finished telling me about one of her friends granddaughters joining the peace corp when Coach made the announcement that he and the team were going to the lockers to get ready for the game. I helped Mrs. Taylor and the boosters clean up before we all went up to the stands. Ella found us and about 10 minutes later Matt and Julie showed up looking sickeningly cute and in love.

"I owe you one." He said quietly.

"Ew Matt, what'd I say about that kinda talk."

"I meant for going to the booster thing."

"Yeah right." I said. "And the booster thing wasn't- it wasn't awful I guess."

"Let's go Lions!" Grandma shouted, throwing her arms around.

"Mrs. Saracen you sure you weren't a rally girl back when you were in high school?" Ella asked. "You've got some killer moves."

The Lions did end up losing, but only by a tie breaker. But when you forfeit your season opener and continue to get wrecked every week (to be fair by smaller and smaller point gaps), losing in a tie breaker is kind of bitter sweet. I was hanging out by the car with Grandma and Ella. Julie and Mrs. Taylor'd gone home with Coach and Matt was in line for a hotdog (getting one'd become sort of a tradition to cheer Landry up after a Lion loss).

"Personally I'm glad Matthew wasn't a Lion." She said. "The blue uniforms brought out his eyes so much more than red and white would have."

"I never thought about it like that Grandma." I said, me and Ella trying not to laugh.

"Well would you look who's coming over here." Els said.

"Hi again." I looked over and saw Luke.

"Oh hey." I turned to my Grandmother. "Grandma, this is Luke Cafferty. He goes to school with me."

"Oh well now I know _him_, I mean he was just on the field." She said.

"Luke this is my grandmother, Lorraine Saracen."

"Pleasure to meet you ma'am." He said.

"I've seen you play these last few games." Grandma said. "You're awful good."

"Aw thank you." He said. "Well a couple of kids are getting together to relax after the game. Ella you're coming right?"

"Sure am." She said clearly amused at how nervous I felt.

"Well," Luke went on talking to Grandma "I wanted to ask you if it'd be okay for Lydia to come? That is, if she's interested." I felt like a did one of those loud, cartoon gulps Bugs Bunny always did.

"If Lydia wants to go it sounds fine to me." She smiled.

"Grandma, we gotta get you home and what about your hair?" I asked.

"Oh I'll be fine sweetheart." She turned back to Luke. "You'll make sure she gets home safe?"

"Yes ma'am." Luke said. "In fact I just got my truck re-serviced so it's never been safer."

"I'm pretty sure the she's more concerned about safer_ sex_-." Ella whispered to me. I elbowed her in the ribs and prayed I was the only one that heard her. Then I saw Matt still online over at the hot dog stand. "I'll be right back." I didn't really know what I was going to say, but I knew I didn't want to say it in front of Luke.

"Hey. I got Landry a chili dog this week, since they almost won and all."

"Uh-huh." I ignored him. "I need to talk to you...You didn't have any plans tonight, right?"

"Not really. Why, what's wrong Lyd?"

"Nothing." I said. "Nothings wrong."

"Really? Because that face you're making right now usually means trouble." Matty said.

"No, there's no trouble. It's just there's a party I wanted to go to."

"You want me to drop you off or something?" He asked.

"No I got a ride..." I said looking away. "Remember the guy that picked me up with Landry yesterday?" He nodded. "Well he's taking me to the party."

"Cool." Matt said.

"...What?"

"Saves me a trip." He shrugged. I crossed my arms. "...What? Now what's wrong?"

"I don't know." I said. "You're my big brother and I'm not saying I wanted some overprotective freak out, but this is kind of the first guy I've gotten those stupid stomach butterflies over and I don't care what kind of women's intuition, 6th sense thing Shelby and Ella have, you're my best friend and I need you to tell me how to deal with this." He just stared at me. "Matty!"

"S-sorry." He jumped. "That was just a lot to take in."

"You're telling me." I said. "I mean I'm not this girl. I'm kinda freakin' out."

"Why? You've been on dates before."

"Yeah when Ella's stuck with her date's brother/cousin/best friend and can't find anyone else to unload'em on. Or when I let Baldwin Herman take me to formal last year because somebody started taking bets on whether he could find anyone that would say yes. That's not really the kind of thing that makes a girl weak in the knees."

"But this Luke kid does?" He asked.

"My knees don't get weak but...he makes me laugh. And not even just when he says stuff, during the game I thought about this thing he said about Landry's band and laughed in the middle of something Mrs. Taylor was saying. And- and he's the reason I even bothered doing that mockup for the paper on my own."

"Seems nice so far. What're you so afraid of?"

"I don't know." I said. "What if it turns out I'm a total spazz when I actually like a guy. Most people get through the spazzy parts before they're my age right?"

"What're you kidding?" He said. "I became more of a spazz when I met Julie and I never got over it."

"I guess...but I barely just met him. What if he seems nice but he's a total jerk and I get hurt."

"I didn't really know Jules either. Getting to know her was the good part. And if you suddenly decide he's a jerk, then I go from best friend to big brother mode and beat him up." He said simply.

"Matt." I sighed.

He put up his hands. "What, that's only if he hurts you..._or_ if he tries to kiss you."

"Matt."

"Fine, he can kiss you. Once. On the cheek. Anything more and I beat him up, does that seem fair?" Matty asked.

"Not even remotely." I smiled.

"You'll be fine Lyd." He said. Really that's all I ever needed to hear.

"Where's my hot dog?" Landry said walking over. Matt handed it to him. "Chili dog? Awesome. Hey since you're already spoiling me, care to do me another favor?"

Matt eyed him suspiciously before saying "What is it?"

"You know that girl I've been talking to." He said. "Jess."

"If by talking to you mean ran over her bike." I said.

"You never said you ran over her bike!" Matt said.

"I didn't."

I rolled my eyes. "Landry I _saw_ you do it."

"Well maybe that was fate bringing us together." He said turning back to my brother. "Whatever it was, she's going to the party tonight so I nee you to be my wing man."

"I've gotta stay with Grandma tonight."

"Lyd'll be there." Landry said. "She'll be fine."

"She's going to the party, you know since **she** actually goes to East Dillon." Matt explained.

Landry made a huge, overly exaggerated sigh. "I need a pointman. Lyd never go to parties and the one time you decide to go is when I need Matt to be my copilot."

"First off stop saying things like that. You sound like a tool." Matt said. "Secondly I wouldn't want to crash a high school party of a school I didn't even go to, just to be your assistant stalker anyway."

"Fine, I guess Lydia can be my wing woman. Not as cool, but I guess you'll do." Landry said.

"Thanks for that really awesome opportunity." I said sarcastically. "But I'm actually going to hang out with somebody."

"Tell Ella she can help." He shrugged. "Maybe 2 wing women add up to a wing man."

"I didn't mean Ella." I looked over at Luke, who looked adorable laughing about something with my grandmother.

Landry followed my gaze. "You're going on a date with Luke?"

"I mean it's not dinner and a movie or anything. Just hanging out at a party."

"Regardless." He said. "The point is you _do_ like him and more importantly _I_ was right."

I shook my head. "Shut up Landry."

"Remember when I said-"

"Shut. Up. Landry!"


	5. Chapter 5

A/N: Hey guys! Here's the new part. It's also the stories first update since the series finale :( I hope you like it!

Landry and Luke still needed to do some post game thing in the locker room. I convinced Matty to that he and Grandma didn't need to wait. Ella had demanded Landry give her a ride to the party so after Matt and Grandma took off, Els and I waited in the parking lot. She spent the whole time coming up with ways to make "Luke and Lydia sitting in a tree" dirty. After about 10 minutes of that, I was more than glad when the boys came back from the locker room.

"See ya'll in a bit." I said as they headed to Landry's car.

"Want anything from the Alamo Freeze?" Ella asked.

"What?" Landry said. "We're not stopping at the-"

"Oh would you quit whining. I want a chocolate mudslide. It'll take all of 4 minutes." She said and he had no choice but to cave. "See ya'll."

"She sure is assertive." Luke smiled.

"Oh yeah." I agreed. "We met in girl scouts when we were kids. Ella had the highest sales record out of any of us. She all but bullied people into buying cookies. She would have broke some kind of record if she didn't quit before awards."

"I'll bet you were a pretty good salesman yourself."

"Not even a little bit." I said. "I was so shy I had to make all of my stops with my brother. And of corse Matt didn't want his friends to see him selling girl scout cookies so I had to trade him first shower privileges for like 2 weeks to do it. And we used to get like 15 minutes of hot water max so that totally sucked."

"I guess that's understandable." He said. "I'm an only child, so I guess the whole fighting for shower time, nuggies and nicknames thing has always seemed pretty cool to me."

"Between that and saying me and Grandma were cool earlier, I'm starting to question your definition of 'cool'."

"Well.." Luke smiled. "I think anyone that can talk about football strategy the way you were on the phone before the game is pretty cool... Especially if she's half as pretty as you."

I looked down. Up until now I'd sort of been able to put the whole "date" aspect of this thing on the sidelines. I mean we'd just been two people talking and it was somehow really easy for me to talk to him. In fact I was downright rambling. But I didn't know what to say now. Was I supposed to be flirty too. What did that even mean?

I guess Luke could feel the awkward silence too because he said "I'm sorry. That was totally lame. I didn't mean it like that."

"You didn't?" I asked, a little sad.

"No- I mean yes- I mean..." He stopped for a second. "I _do_ think you're pretty. I just- I didn't mean to be so cheesy. Y'probably think I'm the biggest goon in Texas."

I smiled hearing his words echo my earlier thoughts. "I wouldn't say _the biggest_."

He looked over and caught my smile, spurring him to sport one of his own.

By the time we got to the party we were back in the rhythm of conversation. I told him about all the ideas we were working on for the newspaper and he told me about some of the stuff he did on his farm. Generally, the after game parties were in the middle of a feild. Normally off somebody's property. The exact location changed from week to week depending on who's parent's were out. It also helped us from getting caught (all the cops in the area knew there was a party going on, but as long as we at least pretended we were being stealthy, so did they).

Somehow there were already a few kids that seemed drunk by the time we got there (freshmen/rally girls who pounded beers within minutes of arrival or kids who'd been pregaming for the party during the game). "Want something to drink?" Luke held out a can.

"I'm not much of a drinker." I said and he put it back. "Just don't like the taste of beer is all. It's not like I have anything against it if you want one."

"Oh no." He said. "Your grandmother made me promise that nothing even a little alcoholic would touch these lips until I got you home."

I felt myself blush. "She did not."

"Sure did." He said. "She also wanted to see my insurance, but Ella talked her out of it."

"Oh my Lord, that's got to be the most embarrassing thing ever." I shook my head.

"Well if it makes you feel any better, its pretty embarrassing when a grandmother tells you in the nicest way possible that you could stand to get your speed up on the field."

"Yeah, Grandma's definitely good for that." I nodded. "She's Matty's biggest fan, but she used to tell him his feet were slow as molasses. She doesn't mean any harm by it."

"Harm? Heck no." He said. "She's 100 percent right. I was okay resting on my laurels back on the Panthers, but the Lions aren't together enough for that. I'm gonna start on some time drills."

"My grandmother'll be happy to hear that." I said with a little smirk.

"Must be cool coming from a football family." He said.

"We're not exactly a _football family_." I shrugged. "My brother always played and that's how I got really into the technical parts of the game, but other than that we love Texas football just like every other family in Dillon, I guess."

"Not _every_ other family." He said messing with the button on his shirt.

"Your parents ain't much for the game?" I immediately scolded myself for doing that nosy thing Ella always said I did.

"You could say that." He said. I'd already told myself to leave it at that when he continued. "My dad just thinks it cuts into my chores. Sometimes he needs me on the farm, but I have to get to practice, you know stuff like that. And to be honest I think my mother's just scared I'll end up breakin' a nail. Don't get me wrong, they're both great people. It's just strange when the other guys talk about working on handoffs with their dads and their moms making them special pregame carboload meals. If i told my parents my sprint time's too slow, they'd probably say its just God's way of telling me I should quit."

I was at a loss for words. Luke didn't seem like the kind of guy you got to talk about stuff like this so early in knowing him (not even with my nosy tendencies). I wanted to respond in a way that would be worthy of him opening up to me. "You should run parachutes." I blurted. He looked at me, confused and I wanted to crawl in a hole somewhere. But there was nowhere to run and once I'd started I had to finish. "Smash, the panthers old running back, he used to run with a parachute attached to his back. The resistance makes it so you run faster when the parachutes not there." Why was I still talking?

"...Where would I get a parachute?"

"I'm not really sure where he got his, but it's probably still over at his place. My brother still talks to him every once in a while. I'll have him ask if I can borrow it for you." I offered.

For a second he had a look in his eye that made me think I wasn't the only one that wanted to run and hide. But just as quickly as it came, the look was gone, replaced with that cute, goofy smile. "You're somethin' else, aren't you?" His smile was contagious and I looked away to hide one of my own.

"Heads up! One coconut cone with chocolate jimmies coming through." Ella said making her way over to us with Landry. She handed me the cone. "I know you said you didn't want anything but its your favorite and Landry was buying so..."

"Just to be clear, I wasn't exactly offering when you asked if I had 5 bucks and then just gave it to the cashier."

"Well thanks anyway Landry." I said giving him a kiss on the cheek.

"Come on Landry." Ella said pulling him with her. "I'm excited to play wing man."

"I'm already regretting this." Landry sighed going with her.

Luke and I walked around so that he could say hi to some of his teammates. "Hey, Cafferty." Curtis Grey said clapping him on the back. He'd clearly had a few. "Good call on that man to man stuff."

"Hey Grey." Luke said.

He looked to me. "You're that chick from Applebees right?"

"Well that's my formal name but you can go ahead and call me Lydia." I eyed him, but didn't want to cause a problem. "Good blocking out there tonight."

"Aw I do what I can. It's my first year too." He said dusting himself off. "Naturally gifted I guess."

"Yeah, I guess." I said. "You might want to work on timing drills, but other than that-"

His face fell. "Excuse me? What exactly do you mean there darlin'?"

"Oh I didn't mean anything." I said. "There were just a couple of plays that could have ended a little better if your block was a second sooner or later."

"And how long have _you_ been playing football?" He asked offended.

"Curtis calm down." Luke said. "She was just trying to help."

"I don't need football advice from your little girlfriend." He said.

"I'm not his girlfri- I was just-"

"What does she know about football?" He said.

"Well that man to man thing was her idea, for starters." Luke said. "But regardless, you need to calm down. That's twice I've had to tell you. I wont say it again."

They stared at each other for a second. "Whatever man." Curtis said walking away.

"I'm real sorry about that." Luke said.

"It's my own fault." I said. "I stick my nose in where it doesn't belong all the time. I _don't_ play football."

"You were right though. Coach has been telling him to work on his timing for weeks now...He's not normally like that, he's probably had a few too many and he's coming of the adrenaline of the game and all." He said. "That ain't an excuse, but..."

"No, I get it. It's okay." I said. "Although I _am_ gonna have to spit in his cola the next time comes into Applebees."

"Really?" He said

"I'm totally kidding." I laughed.

"Good cause that'd be so gross." He said. "My mom is like, convinced the guy at the fairgrounds hates her for some reason. And she's told me since I was a kid that he messes with our food."

"Why does he hate her?"

"He doesn't!" Luke said. "She just gets these ideas and then there's no changing her mind." I smiled and it seemed like we'd dodged another awkward moment until someone stumbled into Luke. "Whoa." He said as the kid almost fell in front of us. "Easy there bud."

I realized it was Dale Floyd. I'd known him since kindergarden and I'd never seen him so much drink the wine from communion. "Dale, are you _drunk_?"

"No." He grunted. "Ella Riggins just walked up and punched me in the jewels."

"Oh yeah." I said. "She said that was her plan."

"What?" Luke asked.

"Thanks for the heads up Lydia." Dale said, still doubled over.

"Thank yourself." I said. "You know better than sending her dirty text messages."

"I didn't." Dale said. "I didn't send her anything. I don't even have my phone. My stupid little brother hid it this morning and wont give it back. I tried to explain but she didn't let me finish and now I just wanna go home but my rides not ready. Anyway, I didn't mean to interrupt your date."

"You didn't interrupt anything hun." I said, feeling bad for poor Dale. Things just weren't going his way. I looked up at Luke. "I hate to ask but..."

"Come on buddy." Luke said to Dale. "We're taking you home."


	6. Chapter 6

A/N: Hey guys! Hope you like the new part!

Dale was feeling better by the time we got to his house, but since it was minutes away from my house we just decided to call it a night.

"Well thanks for the ride." I said not knowing what to do when Luke pulled up to the house.

"Oh no-no problem." He said seemingly just as unsure as I was.

Never a fan of uncomfortable silences, I decided to cut my losses and went for the door. "Alright then. Night."

"Lydia wait." He stopped me and I froze a little. "I..I guess..." He sighed. "Have a good night."

That was it? I mean he looked like he wanted to say more and _I _sure as heck wanted him to say (and maybe even _do_) more, but that was it. I got out of the car and once I'd opened the door to the house, I heard Luke pull away.

"Hey Lydia Jean." Grandma said and Matt looked over.

"Hi Grandma."

"What happened, I thought you were going to that party." Matty said.

"I did."

He looked at his watch. "For what? 5 minutes?"

"We just left early." I explained. "No big deal."

Matt followed me into my room. "Did he do something?"

"...What?" I asked confused. "Who?"

"That Luke kid? Did he do something to upset you? Is that why you're home so early."

"No. Jeez Matt." I said. "Dale Floyd got sick and Luke offered to take him home. It just made more sense for him to drop me off too."

"_Dale Floyd _got sick?" Matt said. "I never considered him to be a lush."

"He wasn't drinking. Ella punched him in the manwich."

"Oh." He said, as if that made perfect sense. "So you had a good date then?"

"Honestly." I shrugged. "I'm starting to think it wasn't even really a date. We were just sort of hanging out I guess. Maybe I got all panicky over nothing before."

"Lyds-"

"You know I'm kinda tired Matty." I said. "I think I'm just gonna crash."

He got the hint and went back out to Grandma. I got ready for bed and was about to turn my light off when my phone rang. "Hello?" I answered without looking at the screen.

"Lyd?"

"Ella?" I said. "What's up?"

"Where are you?" She asked. "We've been looking all over for you."

"We left." I said. "Like 30 minutes ago."

"Are ya'll parking?" She asked. "You. Naughty. Girl!"

"We're not parking." I said. "I'm in bed."

"What?"

"By myself." I clarified. "We had to take Dale home after you attacked him."

"Oh you know he provoked me." She said. "I firmly believe in swift justice."

"Well _he_ didn't provoke you, Nancy Grace. His brother did." I explained about the phone situation.

"Oh." She said. "Well hell, why didn't he just say so?"

I sighed. "He tried Els. You just interrupted him by immediately resorting to violence."

"Well sorry."

"You don't have to apologize to me dude." I said. "I'm not the one that got junk punched for no reason."

"Then I'll apologize to Dale in the morning." She said. "Geez no wonder you were the first to get you 'Working It Out' badge in scouts."

"ELLA!" I heard behind her.

"You better get back to the party." I said. "Sounds like you're in high demand."

"No that's just Landry." She said. "He was looking for you with me. Hold on- SHE WENT HOME YOU IDIOT!"

I laughed. "Alright then. Ya'll be safe."

"Sure thing _Mom_." She said hanging up.

Getting to bed that early had the positive and negative result of me waking up a 6AM on a Saturday. Though I probably could have done with the extra sleep, the stolen time gave me a chance to get some schoolwork in and make a special breakfast for Matt and Grandma. I went with pancakes, homefries and eggs over easy.

"Well aren't you sweet?" Grandma smiled handing Matt the eggs.

"Yeah, thanks LJ." Matt said.

"Uh-oh." I said.

He winced, now knowing the nickname had given him away. "I picked up a shift over at Panther Pizza. You mind going to the grocery store?" I actually enjoyed doing the food shopping. Checking the list on what seemed to me like a pirates treasure hunt, all the while accompanied by the calming drones of smooth jazz "musak". But liking the chore or not, Matt and I both knew that wasn't the issue. I was supposed to be with Grandma that morning, so I'd have to take her along.

Don't get me wrong, I love my grandmother. We both did. But shopping with her is a chore and a half. She disagrees with everything on the list, seems to know everybody in the store worth a long conversation and gets riled at the mention of the budget. Somehow 30 minutes turns into 3 hours, your exhausted from your bones to your skin and you still don't end up with everything you needed in the first place. This is why we tried to save each other the trouble and plan supermarket trips when we knew the other would be at home with her.

I obviously couldn't say that to her. It'd break my poor grandmother's heart to know any of it, so instead I tried an excuse. "Well," I smiled tightly. "how are we gonna get there if you have your car? Shelly's got work and Landry's got practice."

"No problem." He smiled back, cutting off my way out. "I called in a favor."

My smile fell. "What kind of favor?"

Half an our later Grandma and I were waiting on the front porch when Tim Riggins' truck pulled up.

"Hustle up, we're losing daylight you lions groupie." Ella screamed from the passenger seat.

"What'd she just say?" Grandma asked.

"Uhhh...She said..."I stalled. "She she's feeling woozy."

"Oh." Grandma said. "Take deep breaths Darlin'. Tim Riggins? Is that you?"

"Yes ma'am. How you doin' Mrs. Saracen?" Tim said, getting out from the drivers side.

"I'm doing just fine." She said. "Don't tell me you're our driver to the grocery?"

"I sure am." He smiled. Ella got out of the passenger seat so that Grandma could sit in the front. Tim helped her up into the truck while me and Els hopped into the back.

Ella seemed kind of on edge and I thought maybe things were still weird between her and her brothers. Luckily, Grandma filled the void, quizzing Tim about everything going on in his life, which honestly didn't sound like much, but Grandma still loved hearing about it. Now anybody with a novice understanding of my grandmother would simply assume she was being a sweet old woman. But I was a professional, so I knew exactly why she cared about the lackluster life of Tim Riggins: She thought he was a total hottie. I know, it seems crazy but its totally the truth. Maybe once you hit bingo playing age you can no longer be considered a cougar, but whatever the elderly woman animal equivalent is, that was my grandma. She didn't just bake pies for Coach Taylor all the time because she had nothing better to do. It was her version of flirting.

So I sat there feeling all icky as she gazed at him and getting ZERO help from Ella when I tried to derail the flirting. I almost let out a sigh of relief when we finally pulled into the supermarket parking lot.

Somehow it was harder to shop with Tim and Ella than it would have been with just Grandma. There she was doing her normal supermarket routine, only this time she had backup in the form of Tim Riggins. He literally had no clue how to shop. At one point he handed me dish soap claiming it was just the same as laundry detergent. And I didn't know what planet Ella was on. She just silently roamed the isles, occasionally throwing something random in the cart like some kind of 4 year old.

"I just don't understand why it has to be so hot in here." Grandma said.

I thought for a second before I saw an opportunity. "You know Grandma, you're right. You should wait for us in the car. We'll only be but a minute. Tim would you mind taking her?" I pasted on my sweetest smile and tried not to do a happy dance when they both started walking back to the parking lot. "Okay _now_ we can probably get through this in like 10 minutes." But Ella was too busy starring off into space to hear me. "Els?"

"Huh?" she said startled.

"What's going on with you today?"

"Nothing." She said in a way that totally contradicted her.

Given my nature to pry, I couldn't just leave it at that. "Ella something's clearly up. Are you still upset about Tim being home?"

She shook her head. "No, that's all getting back to normal...Look if I tell you something do you promise you wont freak out."

"Sure." I said, getting an instant bad feeling about this.

"Last night..." She sighed and started over. "Last night after you left, me and Landry went looking for you. And once you told me you'd left and all that stuff about Dale, I felt a bit guilty and drank a little bit and finally decided I just wanted to go home. Landry couldn't find the girl he was looking for so he said he'd take me. And on our way-I swear I don't know how it happened-but along the way...we started making out."

"Wait. What?" I froze. "You and _Landry_?" She nodded. "Landry _Clarke_?"

"You said you wouldn't freak out."

"I'm not." I said. "Okay maybe I am, but...I mean it's _Landry_. And not that he's not a good guy I just never, like in a hundred thousand years would have thought about you and Landry getting together."

"We're not _together_." She said. "It was just a thing. A one time only, never happening again, beer decision thing."

"Of course." I said. "Although you do seem to be getting pretty worked up over this thing."

She sighed. "Can you please not be annoying about this?"

"About the fact that you clearly have a crush on Landry." I said.

".NOT." She said.

"But don't you remember? _Girls can just sense these things about other girls_, right Els?" I said mocking her.

"Can we just hurry up and get back to the car before my brother has your grandma doing donuts in the parkin' lot?"

"Sure thing, Mrs. Clark." I said before taking off. I knew Ella well enough to expect her to tackle me for it, but the momentary pain and the stares of the other shoppers were both totally worth it.

When we got back home, Tim offered to take a look at our tv. It'd been doing some weird popping thing lately and Grandma just hated it. While he was messing around with that, my grandmother took a nap and I offered to make us all a quick lunch to thank Ella and Tim for taking us shopping. Tim went outside to look at some wire or another and Ella popped up onto the counter. "So now that my little accidental quickie is out in the open, what happened with you and Cafferty last night?"

"I already told you." I said.

"You told me ya'll left early to get Dale home. Don't expect me to believe nothing happened when you were alone."

"Believe what you want." I said. "But that's what happened."

"He didn't even try to kiss you?" She asked.

I rolled my eyes. "No Ella. He didn't even try to kiss me. **Nothing **happened**.**"

"...Was he drunk?" She asked carefully. "Claudette Poole told me whenever Shooter gets too much in'em, he's all but worthless in bed."

"We weren't getting in any bed." I said. "...And he didn't have a drink all night anyways. Promised Grandma he'd stay dry."

"Well," She thought. "maybe he _needed_ a drink. You know, a little liquid courage."

"No." I said. "I just don't think that's what last night was about. You know, dating and all. We're just friends, maybe that's all he wanted…wants."

"Screw maybe." She said. "If you wanted to know, you should have asked him point blank if he thought last night was about ya'll dating. For Pete's sake, grow a pair Lyds."

"B-but if you think about it, we just barely met. You don't go from complete strangers to dating in a few days."

"Um, yeah you do." Ella said. "See I refuse to let our brothers ruin everything."

"What does that mean." I asked.

"Matt and Julie. Tim and Lyla. We've grown up surrounded by these dramatic romances? We're in _high school_ Lyds. It doesn't have to be that way. I know some people that have met and started dating between lunch and final bell. I mean, Claudette and Shooter got together right before prom and were engaged by graduation."

"Okay well Claudette Poole also gave a lap dance to a teacher to pass gym class, so I'm not exactly taking her sage advice." I said.

"Oh is that why Mr. Groton got fired from West Dillon?" Ella asked.

"When do you even hang out with her?" I asked.

"Oh she works at the Landing Strip with Mindy now, so she's always at the house."

"The Landing Strip, huh. That's a shocker." I said sarcastically.

"She's not stripping. " Els explained. "I mean she's barely showing, but in a few months they'll need a forklift to get her on that stage."

"Claudette's pregnant?" I asked.

"Yup. Thats why she got the job in the first place. She works in the kitchen. Makes really good money too." Ella said.

I stared at Ella in disbelief. None of what she was saying was so shocking. In fact it was all too common. I only had a couple more years left of high school and as much as I couldn't wait to be over that whole thing, what came next was terrifying. Mostly because I had no clue what would come next. I figured Matty'd be the one to get out. If he got himself stuck in Dillon, I didn't stand a chance. I didn't want to be in Dillon, working at Applebees for the rest of my life.


	7. Chapter 7

a/n: Here's the next part. Hope you like it!

I was still thinking about being stuck in Dillon later on at work. I'd been so into my thoughts that I wasn't exactly on my way to employee of the month. I'd totally spaced on one of my drink orders and forgot to push the new appetizers the way I was supposed to. So I was less than surprised when my boss called me into his office toward the end of my shift. He actually didn't know about all the mistakes I'd made that day. Instead he told me that he needed to change my schedule yet again.

"Hon, I need to switch you to the lunch shift on Wednesdays and Thursdays." He said.

"I can't do that sir. I have school during the week, remember?"

He scratched his head. "Oh geez, you sure do. Well that puts us in a bit of a pickle there. You see I've got too many people on during the weekend so I'm redistributing everyone's hours. I can't let you keep all of your weekend shifts. That's not fair to everyone else. I've already got you on two weekday dinner shifts and that's more than any of the other girls as it is. Now you're welcome to keep those nights, but I'm still gonna have to cut your weekend just like everybody else."

I nodded, thanked him and excused myself. I didn't know what else there was to say. As much as I understood where he was coming from, I made most of my money during my weekend shifts and we were barely getting by on that. How was I going to tell my brother, who worked all the dang time as it was, that I wasn't going to be able to contribute as much anymore? Just a few minutes before I was feeling bad for myself about working at Applebees forever and now I worried about working there less. I finished out my shift and waited for Matty to pick me up. As he went on and on about some new way Grandma's insurance company was trying to screw us, I tried to think of a way to fix this mess.

I avoided Matt when I got home. Left him out with Grandma and made up something about an English paper. I knew I had to talk to him about it, but I couldn't bring myself to do it the next morning either. This was a bit of a problem considering Matt and Grandma always dropped me off for my Sunday shift after church. That same Sunday shift I no longer had. I had to say something, but every time I went to tell Matty the words would get stuck in my throat until suddenly I was in my uniform, waving goodbye as they drove away from the Applebees parking lot. "You're a moron." I said to myself. "You're a moron, coward, dummyhead."

The restaurant was apart of one of those strip mall kinda things so I walked around a couple of the stores while continuing to berate myself. It was in the second to last store, a fabric shop, when I heard someone say my name. My stomach clenched as I turned around. "Luke."

"Hey." He said with that half smile.

"You starting your own clothing line?" I asked pointing to the reams of fabric he was holding.

"What?" He looked down at his arms. "Oh. No my mom's helping with the costumes for the kids pageant at church. She sent me to pick up some stuff and gave me a list but to be honest, I'm not even sure any of this is right. I have no idea what tul-y is and here she just wrote 'lame', which has gotta be wrong."

"It's _tulle_ and _lamé_." I giggled. "You want me to help you find it?"

"Please." He begged.

15 minutes later we were leaving the store. "Thank you so much Lydia." He said. "I would have been here for hours."

"No problem." I said.

"Can I buy you lunch or something to say thanks?" He asked, gesturing over to Applebees.

"No." I said quickly.

"Oh." He nodded. "Okay."

"No I want to I just meant-"

"You don't have to explain." He said, sincerely. "It's totally fine."

"Would you listen?" I said. "I want to get lunch with you. I just can't go in there."

"Oh." He said. "I guess I wouldn't want to if I had to be there all the time for work either. And you're still in your uniform and everything. I get it."

I could have just left it at that, but I didn't. I'd been almost at a breaking point with wanting to tell Matty for a whole day and somehow, standing there with Luke, it just all came out. After I explained it all, it hit me what I'd just done and I kind of wanted to cry from embarrassment. This was the boy I liked. This was the boy I thought liked me, but was starting to think didn't (and if he did I'd just given him enough reason not to). This was not the way you were supposed to handle a crush.

After what felt like forever, Luke said, "Well there's Chinese like 5 minutes away."

At first I didn't even understand. "W-what?"

"If you want, there's a take out place a little ways from here." He said.

"Oh...Okay." I said. I followed him to his truck and in 10 minutes or so I was eating an egg roll.

"I'm real sorry about what's going on with your job and all." He said before biting into a french fry. I'd almost started believing I'd imagined telling him the whole thing.

"Thanks." I said. "And thanks for the food. I'd probably have snacked on tic tacs until Matt came to pick me up from my nonexistent shift."

"It seems like you're more worked up about telling your brother than you are about losing the hours." He said. "It's not like it's your fault."

"I know." I said. "And I don't think Matt'll be upset. He'll just pick up more shifts at Panther Pizza or get a second job or something to keep us stable. But I don't want that for him. He works too hard as it is. I don't want to add stress to his plate."

"Well I've always worked on the farm so I'm not really sure what's out there, but there's gotta be something for you that'll let you work on the weekends."

"My brother used to work for the Alamo Freeze so I was thinking of stopping by there to see if they needed anybody." I said.

"Yeah." He nodded. "I mean come on. I've seen you in class. You're smart, and you work hard and you're nice. I'm sure you can get another job."

I felt myself blushing. "Thanks."

His phone rang. "Hold on a sec." He said, but his smile faded a little when he saw the screen. "Hello?... I was just on my way ove-" He looked over at me. "Will you excuse me for just a minute." Luke said before walking a little bit away. "I'm almost done...Yes ma'am. I know...I love you too."

"Something wrong?" I asked when he came back over.

"That was my mother. She's just wondering if I got all her fabric stuff." He explained.

"Oh gosh." I said. "I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to hold up your day."

"No no, you're not." He said, but I could see the look on his face and he'd clearly just gotten chewed out. I told him I was done eating anyway and we headed back over to the strip mall.

"Well," He said, pulling up to Applebees "I didn't expect going on an errand for my mother to be so nice."

I nodded, not knowing what to say. Was this just a pit stop on an errand run? How had this happened again? For the second time, I was totally at a loss as to how Luke Cafferty felt about me. I started thinking about what Ella'd said about growing a pair and all and then I felt it again. That same rush that made me tell him all about my work problems. It quickly built up until "Why didn't you kiss me Friday night?"

He seemed to falter and I cursed Ella for giving such crap advise. "I didn't think I was supposed to."

"_Supposed_ to?" I asked.

"Yeah. Landry said I shouldn't."

"_Landry_ said?" I stopped him. "What does Landry have to do with anything?"

"Before we left for the party, when me and him went back into the locker room, Landry said he thought you wouldn't want me to kiss you on our first date."

I wanted to break something. Namely Landry's neck. "First off never listen to Landry Clarke. Okay? Never ever. And secondly, Friday night _was_ a date?"

"I-I thought so." Luke said.

"What about just now?"

"I don't know." He said. "I mean- I don't know. Tinker thinks dates have to be-"

"_Tinker_?" I would have laughed out loud if I hadn't been so dang frustrated. "Luke...forget what Tinker thinks. Forget what Landry thinks. What about you? What do you think?"

"I think..." He paused. "I think you're an awesome girl. I think I like you. Like really like you...And I think if the Lions start playing decent enough to get us some team jackets, I want you to be the one to wear mine." That might not sound like much, but in Dillon Texas that's a pretty big deal. The big smile on my face spread so fast, I couldn't even try to hide it. Luke's met it with one of his own before he leaned in and kissed me.

I'd been kissed before. Either by boys who were too afraid and barely pecked me or overzealous ones who tried to eat my face. But this one was so different. Not just because Luke was the perfect mix of sweet and exciting, but because _I_ was different. I'd never wanted a kiss as bad as that one.

His phone rang and he pulled back so that our lips were only inches apart. "I _also_ think that if I don't get this fabric to my mother in 10 minutes, her head'll explode."


	8. Chapter 8

a/n: hey! here's the new part. hope you like it!

It's amazing what a little kissing'll do. I was still stuck at work, not actually working, I still had to tell Matty what was going on and I still really wasn't clear on what my relationship was with Luke (although I'd pick not being sure if I was his girlfriend over not being sure if he liked me at all any day of the week). But somehow I wasn't as worried. I thought about it and Luke was right. I was a hard worker and there had to be something in all of Dillon that I could do. I mean sure, I did need to get that new job fast if I wanted to keep Matt out of it, but I could do it.

After I while Landry came to pick me up. He drove up to the front and honked the horn, but I stayed sitting right on the bench. After honking a few more times, he got out of the car and came over to me.

"Hello? Do you not see me? What's wrong with you?" He asked.

"What's wrong with me?" I said finally acknowledging him. "I don't know Landry? Why do _you_ think there's something wrong with me?

"I don't know." He shrugged. "Something to do with lady troubles?"

"No." I stood up and stalked over to him. "It's not something to do with _lady troubles_. Not unless that's your nickname for Landry Clarke."

"What? You're not making any sens-" I cut him off by punching him in the arm. "OW! You need to get your anger problems checked. Normal people don't go around punching for no reason."

"No reason? I'd say telling Luke not to kiss me was a pretty good reason Landry." I said.

"Oh." He said. "Okay well, see now you don't know the whole story there."

"Does the whole story include you making out with Ella?" I asked.

"Okay, well damnit Lyds. Which thing are you mad at me for, because I can't deal with both at the same time."

"Just take me home Landry." I huffed and got in the car.

Landry got back in and we drove in silence for about a minute before he pulled over. "Can I just say something?"

"Whatever. It's your car."

"I..I know you're mad at me. And I totally understand that. I shouldn't have said that to Luke." He sighed. "But Lyd you're my best friends kid sister and I've known you since you were little. I know we fight sometimes…_all_ the time but...well you know you're like a sister to me. So when I saw that look on your face after the game, I kinda freaked out. And all of a sudden I was in the locker room and Luke was there and I didn't think before I spoke. And I'm sorry about that."

Landry hardly ever apologized. Not flat out. "Okay I guess." I said. "What about Ella?"

"Aw Lydia you can't get mad at me for meddlin' and then do it yourself."

"I'm not." I said. "I just- I don't want you to get hurt. Either of you."

"Well we won't." He sighed. "It was just a one time thing."

"That's what Ella said too." I said.

"She did?" He asked.

"Yeah...Is that okay?" I said carefully.

"Why wouldn't it be?" I stared at him. "Look I know I've been known to meet a girl and then..."

"Turn into an over analyzing, borderline stalker?"

"I was gonna say get excited." He said. "Either way, I'm not gonna do that this time. No obsessing. No professions of love."

"No marriage proposals?"

"I've never proposed." Landry said. "Who gets engaged in high school?"

"Apparently Claudette Poole. Ella says she and Shooter are getting married and Claudette's pregnant so she's working at the..." I stopped.

"What?" Landry asked.

"Change of plans. Can you drop me over at the Riggins place?"

"Is this about me kissing Ella?" He said.

"No. I just need to ask her a favor."

Landry didn't want to get out of the car, which was fine with me. "Hey Lyds. What's up?" Ella said when she opened the door.

"Do you think you could get me a job at the Landing Strip?"

Ella stared at me for so long, I thought maybe she'd missed my question. "Do you think you could get me a-"

"I heard you." She said. "I just don't _understand_ you." I explained everything that happened over at Applebees. "Thats sucks Lyd, but I don't think hittin' the pole should be your immediate response. And Matt won't let you. Hell I don't even think it's legal yet."

"I don't want to strip Ella." I said. "I want to work in the kitchen. Remember you said Claudette Poole works back there and gets paid pretty well. And you know I can cook just about anything...And I'm not gonna tell Matt. At least not right away. He'd just say no. But if I start working and making good money and never end up half naked, he can't be upset about it later...If you don't wanna do it I can ask Mindy myself."

"No no no." She said. "You don't want to talk to Minds. She's on the new married woman kick where she doesn't want any secrets. She'll tell Billy and he'll tell Tim and you know he'll tell Matt."

"But won't she see me if we work together?"

"Nope. The dancers aren't allowed to go back into the kitchen. The pig owners are afraid they'll start picking at the fries and then wont be hot anymore. Mindy'll never see you. We need to talk to Claudette."

"We?" I asked. "So you're gonna help me?"

"Obviously." She sighed.

"Oh my gosh thankyouthankyouthankyou!" I said hugging her.

"Alright alright." She grumbled and started texting Claudette. "Lets not make this into something crazy. There's just nothing better to do around here, that's all."

"Uh-huh." I said, not believing her in the slightest. If Ella needed to pretend she didn't care, so be it.

"So what'd you do all day at work not working?" She flopped onto her couch.

"Oh nothing. Walked around a bunch of other stores, got some food...kissed Luke."

"What kind of food?" she asked.

"Ella!"

"I'm just messing with you." Els said. "And it serves you right. Been here over 5 minutes and have yet to tell me the important part of the story? Some friend you are. So, how was he?"

"A lady doesn't kiss and tell."

"No that's a gentleman." She corrected. "A lady kisses and tells all over the place. She kisses and tells her freakin' face off."

"Fine." I smiled. "He was wonderful."

"Well I think I know what this really means."

"What are you talking about?" I asked.

"Everyone was right." She shrugged. "I _am_ having a bad influence on you. Working at the Landing Strip, making out with your boyfriend in public..."

"He isn't my boyfrie-"

"You say he isn't your boyfriend one more time and I swear I'll scream." She cut me off.

"But he isn't!" I laughed. "We aren't official or anything."

"Ya'll kissed. What more do you want from the boy, a marriage proposal?"

"Wait a second. So kissing equals dating now?" I said. "I better go tell Landry you two are practically engaged."

"You can shut up now." She said.

"No ma'am. I'm just following your logic."

"Well cut it out. It's annoying." She said throwing a pillow at me. "Besides, you and Luke make sense. You're both cutesy and sweet like a pair of damned Hallmark cards. Landry and I are a frickin' warning label." She looked down at her phone. "You don't work at Applebees on Mondays do you?"

"Nope." I said. "At this point I'm just Wednesdays and Thursdays. Why?"

"Claudette talked to her boss. You got a trial run in the kitchen tomorrow at 6."

"What?" I asked. "Already?" I'd thought this was a good idea, but suddenly with it being real I was starting to rethink that decision. "W-what if I don't know how to do it."

"Do what, make french fries? That's the point of the trial run. It's on a slow night, so you can learn the ropes and all the-" She looked at me. "Lyd you don't _have_ to do this. You don't. I'll text Claudette back right now if you want."

"No." I said. "I- I'm fine. I can do this. It's no big deal."

"Alright." I could tell she didn't believe me.

"I should probably um, head home." I said.

Billy was in the backyard and Ella got him to give me a ride. I was in a daze by the time I got home. I laid on the bed and stared at the ceiling for a good half hour until Matt came and got me for dinner. By that point I'd moved on to panic mode. Talked myself in and out of canceling the whole thing about a hundred times over while Grandma told us about her tv shows. I hadn't thought this through. The Landing Strip was a little outside of town per the request of a number of churches members and elected officials (many of which were regular costumers). Dillon's small, but there's no way I could walk there after school. And there was no way I could ask Landry or Matty. Maybe I could get Claudette to give me a ride? I tried to think of places I could ask Landry to drop me of that were close enough for me to walk to the Landing strip.

"Lyds?" I jumped and realized Matt had been calling me.

"Oh sorry. Yeah?"

"This is for you." He handed me a tiny slip of paper with a number scribbled on it. "Grandma took the message but she forgot to get the name."

"I did not forget the name." Our grandmother said. "I already told you, I wrote it down someplace else and I misplaced it."

"It's alright Grandma." I said. "I'll just call and find out."

"After desert."

"Yes ma'am." I said and sat back down.

" I made a chess cake." After we each had seconds, Grandma finally excused us. It was Matty's night for dishes. Normally I helped him dry, but I felt so damn guilty about everything I was keeping from him I said I was gonna go for a walk. I'd gotten a block away before I realized I should have brought a thicker sweater. I shivered and shoved my hands in my pocket. It was only when I felt the paper that I remembered the number.

"Hello?" The voice on the other end said.

I cleared my throat. "Hi um, somebody from this number called my-"

"Lydia?"

"Yes, hi." I said. "Who am I speaking to?"

"It's Luke." He said.

"Hey. You sound different."

"Oh I'm wearing my mouthguard...I-I mean I uh- What I meant was um..." I couldn't help laughing a little. "You weren't supposed to know that."

"Your secrets safe with me." I said.

"I hope it wasn't a problem, me calling your house. I just wanted to call you and I didn't realize I didn't have your number until I was home. I looked it up in the phonebook. I-I was thinking maybe you would wanna ride with me to school tomorrow?" He offered.

"Oh that'd be nice." I said trying to play it cool.

"Great." He said. "When me and Landry picked you up it was about 7:30. That work for you?"

"Yep. I just have to give Landry a call and let him no I don't need him to take me. " It was hard to believe I'd only really started talking to Luke less than a week ago in Landry's car.

"Alright then." He said. "Guess I'll see you tomorrow."

We hung up and for a second I forgot all the trouble I'd gotten myself into with the Landing Strip. I texted Ella and asked her to ask Claudette if she could give me a ride in to work with her after school. By the time I'd finished sending one to Landry about not needing a ride, Ella'd already written me back. "She says its fine. She'll pick you up after school." Then she forwarded me Claudette's number with the message "Now you can be your own middle man. I'M NOT A DAMN CARRIER PIGEON YOU KNOW."

I laughed and started back for the house.

The next morning, I tried really hard to pretend everything was normal, even though between trying to look "cute" for the ride to school with Luke and packing an extra clothes for The Landing Strip after it wasn't exactly a normal morning.

"Julie's gonna bring a movie over tonight." Matt said as we finished making Grandma's lunch.

"A movie or another documentary?" I asked.

"I thought you liked the last documentary she brought over."

"I liked the last 4 documentaries she brought over." I said. "Doesn't mean she can't ever change it up a bit."

"Maybe I'll see if we can get a comedy or something." He offered.

"Don't bother." I shrugged. "Can't make it anyway."

"You got plans with Ella tonight or something?" Matt asked.

I was about to come up with something when there was a knock on the door. Only the screen door was open so we saw Luke standing there. "Hey." I said.

"Hey." He said back.

"Landry drive you again?" Matt asked.

"No- I- I um..." Luke stammered.

"He's giving me a ride today. Didn't I tell you about that?" I knew I hadn't.

"Must've slipped my mind." Matt said slowly.

"Grandma I'm leaving!" I called out to her. She was still in her room for the morning.

"Have a good day sweetheart!" I heard her yelling back.

Matt walked us to the car. "Y'all be safe."

"Yes sir." Luke said, opening the door for me. "I mean- um..."

Matt looked like he was about to break down laughing. "I'll see you tonight. Love you." I said, trying to help Luke save face.

Luke shook his head as we pulled off. "He probably thinks I'm such a loser."

"What?" I asked. "Who?"

"Your brother. I don't know why I- picking you up from your house instinctively made me call him sir." He said.

"It's not that big a deal."

"No it is." Luke said. "It matters what your brother thinks of me."

"Why?" I asked.

"Because." He said. "Because your brother's a big deal for you. So I don't want him to think your boyfriend is a horses ass."

"My boyfriend?" I asked.

"Yeah." He said. "I mean- no? Are we not- I thought after the kiss and all- oh gosh now Matt's not the only one who thinks I'm a horses ass."

"Luke would you hold on a minute." I said. "I don't think you're an ass. I like the idea of you being my boyfriend, I just didn't know that it was official." I guess Ella was right. God, I knew she'd never let me hear the end of it after that. "And as for my brother, it's totally fine. You were just being polite. Matty's the same way." I assured him.

"Really?"

"Yeah. I mean he's probably still laughing about it back home, but it's still something he'd do." I said honestly.

He smiled that little side grin. "Thanks." Then he rested his right arm on the seat so that it was around my shoulders. It wasn't cheesy or sneaky. It was deliberate and natural and for those reasons alone I leaned into it. It didn't get more official. I, Lydia Saracen, had a boyfriend.


	9. Chapter 9

By lunch I was so over all the questions about Luke from Ella and Landry, part of me thought having a boyfriend wasn't even worth it. I nearly had a panic attack when I saw him walking over to me and Ella at lunch. I could only imagine what sass she was gonna throw his way.

"Hey." He said. "Y'all mind if I sit with you?"

"Of course we don't." Ella said. "I've been meaning to talk to you anyhow."

"Oh Lord." I sighed.

"Hush." She said. "I just had a question is all. Luke doesn't mind, do you Luke?"

"Nope." He said.

"Good." She smiled. "So...What are your intentions?"

"What?" Luke asked.

"Ella, no." I warned.

"Your intentions." She repeated. "With our Lydia here."

"Ella." I said.

"I mean it's important to know what you're after here." She ignored me. "Get what I'm saying."

"I think so." He said.

"Good." Ella said. I wanted crawl under the table. "Just know if those intentions turn to anything but honorable, I will wreck you."

"ELLA." I kicked her under the table.

"Alright, alright." She said getting up. "I'll leave you two be."

Luke laughed. "She's funny."

"Yeah she likes to think so."

"So Coach is making me and Vince watch game tapes after practice." He said.

"Good." I said. "Y'all need to click more on the field…I mean…Sorry."

"To be honest we don't really click that well off the field either." He shrugged. "Anyway, point is if it ain't too much trouble, can you get Landry to take you home?"

"Oh." I said. "I actually have a ride." It suddenly seemed so obvious that if he drove me to school, he would have thought he was taking me home. Only between all the different schedules of Matt picking me up, or me going with Ella or Landry, I just didn't assume. Besides, I kinda needed to get picked up by Claudette for the Landing Strip to work.

"Cool." Luke said. As he started to tell me some story about something Tinker did, I wondered if I should tell him about the Landing Strip. I mean what if the idea of me working there made him think less of me? Or even worse, what if I totally bombed my trial shift and then became the girl who couldn't even get a job at the strip club. Nope. I'd keep this whole thing to myself for the moment.

After school I waited with Els by the parking lot where Claudette was supposed to meet me.

After around 10 minutes she pulled up. "Hey girlies. Sorry I'm late. I was watching one of my Lamaze dvds."

"No problem." Ella said as I got in the car. "Just do me a favor and watch out for Lyds here. She's a little bit of a worrier."

"Feeling squirmy huh?" Claudette asked.

"No I-I'm just a little nervous." I tried to shrug it off. "First day jitters is all."

"Don't go fretting there cupcake." She said. "I'll take good care of you."

Ella winked at me. "You'll do fine. Call me when you're done?"

I nodded and Claudette pulled out of the parking lot. When we got there she introduced me to the Gary manager who was surprisingly nice. We'd carried a giant bag of frozen chicken fingers and some fries out of the deep freezer and started cooking the burgers when Claudette "So you ready to get naked?"

"W-what?" I nearly choked.

"I'm just kidding." She laughed. "Trying to loosen you up a little. Look I was a little nervous before I started at L.S. too, but after a week or so you forget there are half naked girls on the other side of the wall. And you can't beat the money with a stick. Truth be told I came here to get a job as a dancer and had to change my mind when I found out I was pregnant. Best thing that ever happened to me."

I smiled. "That's nice to hear."

"Yeah." She said. "Who would have known us fry cooks make just as much as the dancers."

My smile dropped as I realized she hadn't been talking about her baby. "Is that right?"

"Heck yeah. I mean the dancers make more in the beginning but then they have to pay the DJ and bartender and the costume lady and a ton of other people no matter what they make on stage. We just get our checks and go home. Besides with all my cravings it doesn't hurt to get all the chicken fingers and hot dogs I want."

She was actually right. It was kind of a great gig. I didn't have to run around and be on my feet as much as I did a Applebees and nobody bothered us in the kitchen. We just set the food out on a tray in the hall when the order was ready and somebody came and got it. Mostly we sat back there and talked while scarfing down fried food of one kind or another. Claudette had been on her own back there for a while she was really into having some company. I was surprised when she started cleaning. "Kitchen closes in 20 minutes." She said. "You finish up with the dishes and I'll go check in with Gary. Then its time for us to head home."

When she came back she said he'd offered me a permanent job for the weekends. I'd done it.

I was happy for about ten minutes, but by the time I got home I started getting nervous again. I'd said when I actually got the kitchen job I would tell Matty everything. Now I had it so according to the plan I had to tell him.

"Hey." He said when I came into the house. "You're home late. Were you over at Ella's."

"Um." I bit my lip. "Yep. I was over at Ella's." The plan could wait a little while, right?


	10. Chapter 10

a/n: here's the next part. hope you like it.

The rest of the week sort of blended together, but in a good way. If I ignored the stuff about the Landing Strip, the only new part of my life was Luke. It was nice, the whole having a boyfriend thing. Neither of us was really the clingy type, but we still hung out a lot. I'll admit it was a little awkward spending time with the football guys sometimes, just like I could tell he was a little out of his element around Ella and Julie. My favorite was when we were alone. I know what that sounds like, but most of the time we just talked. It was the best of both worlds being alone with Luke. We were so new to each other that every story or memory was new too. But at the same time, it felt like I'd known him forever.

There was no game that Friday night so the post game party just became the lack of game party. Matt was over at the Taylor's, so I offered to watch Grandma for a while so he could stay over there for dinner. I called Ella and Luke to let them know I couldn't make the party for a while. Ella gave me her usual "wet blanket" speech before telling me to bring Grandma to the party. Luke didn't seem that upset. "Coach is making us have early practice tomorrow since we don't have a game tonight. Probably shouldn't be out partying anyways."

"Look at you Mr. Responsible." I said.

"Yep. That's me. Hey make sure and tell your grandmother I say hello." He said.

"I would but she's taking a nap. She actually had physical therapy today so she's probably out for the night." I thought for a second. "Yup. Matty's gone and Grandma's asleep. Sure is boring all by myself."

"Is that right?" Luke asked. "Well what do you think about me coming over to keep you company?"

"Hmmm that sounds so much better than any stupid party."

"Well then I'll see you in about 20 minutes." As soon as we hung up I started to pick up the living room. It wasn't until I was done clearing off Grandma's magazines that I thought about my room. I'd never invited a guy into my bedroom before and I wasn't sure I was ready now. What if he expected something else? I went and sat on the porch to get some air until he showed up.

"Hey." Luke said.

"Hi." I said and gave him a kiss. "Come on in."

"Smells good in here." He said sitting on the couch.

"Oh I made chilli for dinner." I explained. "But Grandma ate at physical therapy and Matty's at the Taylor's so there's a ton left. You want some? I got some cornbread to go with it."

"Sure." He smiled. "Sounds great." I made him a plate and couldn't help feeling a little proud at the "mmm" sounds he kept making. The nervous feeling about my room faded away as we sat entwined on the couch and watched tv. I felt so comfortable that I leaned over and kissed him deep.

"Lydia." He jumped back. "What about your grandmother?"

"She's asleep." I said. "It's fine."

"I don't know Lyd." I almost laughed at how reversed this situation was playing out from what I'd been worried about. It didn't take much more effort on my part before Luke was on board and kissing my neck. We were getting pretty hot and heavy and I guess I didn't hear the front door.

"Hey y'a- Oh!"

"Shelby!" I said surprised and got off of Luke.

"I was just- I was driving by and I remembered I had some stuff I wanted to bring Lorraine. Some samples from the salon." She said still standing in the doorway.

"Oh that's um, that's nice of you. This is Luke. Luke this is Shelby, she's my, uh, my mother." I couldn't read her expression. Was she pissed? Was that a hint of a smile?

"G-good to meet you ma'am." Luke said, redder than his lions jersey.

"Mmhmm you too." She said, but never took her eyes off me. "Matt home?"

"He's over at the Taylor's for dinner." I told her.

She looked around. "Looks like he missed out on your chilli Lydia."

"We've got a lot left." I said getting up. "I can fix you a bowl."

"That's alright Sugar." She said heading for the door and I felt myself relax a little. "I was just passing thru. Oh but you know what?" She stopped and turned back. "Could you do me a favor, Luke?"

"Uh sure." He said, uneasily.

"If you could try and _not_ get my daughter pregnant, that'd be just great. I feel way to young to be a Memaw."

I almost choked as Luke now turned beet red. "Oh yes ma'am. I-I mean no ma'am. 'Course not."

"Alright then." She smiled. " Y'all have a good night."

"Oh my gosh." I said burying my head into the couch when she was gone. "I'm so so sorry Luke. I'm so embarrassed."

"You're embarrassed?" He said. "_That_ was my first impression on your mother. Your brother already thinks I'm a spazz and now your mother thinks I'm a slimeball."

"She doesn't really. That's just how Shelby is." I explained. "She's just sort of figuring this whole 'mom' thing out, but mostly she's like an older Ella."

"Oh great." He said sarcastically. "I don't think I have it in me for 2 Ella's busting my chops all the time. Downright scary."

I smiled "You don't mind a 300 pound kid running at you full speed, but you're scared of my mother and my best friend."

"I'm not scared." He said, looking so much like a 4 year old I couldn't stop a smile.

"Of course you're not." I said kissing his cheek.

"No way." He said pulling away. "I'm not getting caught again."

"Oh yeah you're totally not scared." I said sarcastically. "Look Shelby's not coming back, Grandma's out cold and my brother's probably busy making out with Julie Taylor…And now that you've made me put _that_ image in my mind, the least you can do is kiss me."

"You're mighty persuasive when you want to be." He said leaning in. Right before our lips touched he stopped.

"What?"

He swallowed. "So tomorrow after practice we're getting our rally girls."

"Oh." I said in my most "I totally don't care" voice.

"Yeah." Luke said uncomfortably. "And well most of the guys, they just get whatever girl picks their number."

"And they say chivalry is dead." I said not quite under my breath.

"But see its kind of an unwritten rule that the guys are allowed to trade if they have a girlfriend and didn't get her."

I was suddenly all too aware of where this conversation was heading. "Look Luke-"

"I know you're not exactly the biggest fan of rally girls." He said, making the biggest understatement ever. There was a time I'd wanted to be a cheerleader, but even then I wasn't all for the rally girls. They were like football groupies. It seemed so pathetic. "But I'm not saying I want you to do all the normal rally girl crap. I wouldn't ask you to decorate my locker or bake me cookies on game days."

"Then what's the point of me doing it?" I asked.

"Cause you're the only one I want to see wearin' my number." He said. I actually wanted to hit him for being so perfect. It made it almost impossible to say no.

"Alright, Mr. Smooth-talker I guess I'm not the only one who can be persuasive."


End file.
